Work in Pro­gress: In con­struc­tion - Clubswan 125

On­ly a han­d­ful of the world’s shi­pyards can af­ford to an­noun­ce – they right­ful­ly ex­pect to be be­lie­ved – he­re’s so­me­thing whi­ch will set a mi­le sto­ne in the ya­ch­ting world. And the­re’s no doubt wha­tsoe­ver that Nau­tor’s Swan is among this éli­te. This re­no­w­ned Fin­ni­sh com­pa­ny, whi­ch has been led by Leo­nar­do Fer­ra­ga­mo sin­ce 1988, has re­cen­tly an­noun­ced to ha­ve be­gun to build what’s to be­co­me the fa­ste­st sai­ling mo­no hull su­per­ma­xi ever at the shi­pyard in Pie­tar­saa­ri: the Clubswan 125. En­ri­co Chief­fi Vi­ce Pre­si­dent at Nau­tor’s Swan said, “We’ve brought to­ge­ther so­me of the world’s be­st con­sul­tan­ts to form a tech­ni­cal team to hand­le eve­ry aspect con­cer­ning this new re­vo­lu­tio­na­ry ya­cht”. And in fact the team is cur­ren­tly ma­de up of im­pres­si­ve spe­cia­lists be­gin­ning wi­th pro­ject de­si­gner Juan Kouy­ou­m­d­jian, who is kno­wn al­so for the quan­ti­ty of me­dals he has col­lec­ted for a va­rie­ty of di­ver­se ac­com­plish­men­ts in top even­ts on the sa­me le­vel as Ame­ri­ca’s Cup, Vol­vo Ocean Ra­ce, Olym­pics, Off­sho­re Speed Re­cords, and World Cham­pion­ships. He ex­plains, “The pre­con­di­tions set at the ba­sis of this pro­ject can be sum­med up in the need to com­bi­ne per­for­man­ce, sta­te of the art tech­no­lo­gy and lu­xu­ry. This means per­for­man­ce in terms of the fee­lings and sen­sa­tions that are uni­que to sai­ling, com­bi­ned wi­th ex­tre­me com­fort in ve­ry spe­cial in­te­riors. The ow­ner’s com­ple­te tru­st and his de­si­re to crea­te a hi­gh-per­for­man­ce su­pe­rya­cht are the per­fect in­gre­dien­ts. We couldn’t ha­ve ho­ped for a bet­ter en­vi­ron­ment in whi­ch to work than this”. The wor­king re­la­tion­ship bet­ween the ow­ner team and the yard, espe­cial­ly in the ini­tial pha­se of a uni­que and per­so­na­li­sed pro­ject su­ch as this one has to be per­fect. MCM (Ma­ri­ne Con­struc­tion Ma­na­ge­ment) com­pa­ny’s foun­ding mem­ber Pe­ter Wil­son, al­so ow­ner’s re­pre­sen­ta­ti­ve con­firms this: “I am plea­sed to re­port the­re’s been fir­st-ra­te col­la­bo­ra­tion bet­ween Nau­tor’s Swan, the en­gi­nee­ring de­si­gn/team and the ow­ner’s team. The con­struc­tion pro­cess has been going well and we look for­ward to the good pro­gress con­ti­nuing over the co­ming mon­ths, in

or­der to con­duct sai­ling trials in the Spring of next year”.

This ex­cep­tio­nal Club­swan125 team whi­ch is grin­ding away at the yard in­clu­des two main ex­perts: Kil­lian Bu­she, in­vol­ved in the con­struc­tion of the hull and struc­tu­ral com­po­nen­ts and Bob Wy­lie, for the deck and sail hand­ling, in­clu­ding spe­ci­fic per­for­man­ce-dri­ven sy­stems. Wy­lie is a world class sai­ling pro­fes­sio­nal who has com­pe­ted in grand prix ya­ch­ting at the hi­ghe­st le­vels for 34 years, is one of the king­pins of the pro­ject. He’s got a for­mi­da­ble re­pu­ta­tion for di­rec­ting com­plex pro­jec­ts on cut­ting-ed­ge boa­ts and op­ti­mi­zing their per­for­man­ce wi­thin class ru­les. Wy­lie said:”on the Club­swan125 we’re pu­shing the li­mi­ts of the sai­ling sy­stems wi­th so­me in­no­va­ti­ve ideas on how to sail the boat wi­th a small crew. I’m thin­king about the in­no­va­ti­ve dag­ger­board sy­stem whi­ch will not be seen on deck and Har­ken’s new ideas for the hard­ware and we’ve been wor­king wi­th Ca­ri­bo­ni to di­sco­ver how be­st to hand­le the si­ze of the sails and loads on the ya­cht along wi­th Sou­thern Spars and Nor­th Sails to en­su­re we ha­ve the cor­rect pla­ce­ment of hard­ware, to suit the sail in­ven­to­ry and loads. It’s been an en­thu­sing ex­pe­rien­ce”.

Let’s ta­ke Wy­lie’s in­spi­ring com­men­ts to look dee­per in­to the ro­le of so­me of the com­pa­nies cal­led in to col­la­bo­ra­te. The Ita­lian Eli­gio Re Fra­schi­ni com­pa­ny whi­ch has been car­ry­ing out re­sear­ch work on di­ver­se ma­te­rials for se­ven­ty years has sup­plied pre­cious tech­ni­cal in­no­va­tion to Ame­ri­ca’s Cup ra­cers, to Vol­vo Ocean Ra­ce boa­ts as well as to For­mu­la 1 and to the au­to­mo­ti­ve in­du­stry. The com­pa­ny has been se­lec­ted to build the keel, bulb, dag­ger­board and rud­ders. The dag­ger­board sy­stem is clear­ly in­no­va­ti­ve and fu­tu­ri­stic even and the cur­ved sha­pe of the hy­dro-foils in­vol­ved are tech­ni­cal­ly ve­ry ad­van­ced. Their sha­pe is cur­ved to ob­tain the be­st la­te­ral th­ru­st in gi­ven con­di­tions as well as de­li­ve­ring mo­re ef­fi­cient lift at hi­gher speeds. The ob­jec­ti­ve is to re­du­ce drag whi­le con­tai­ning the loss of the righting mo­ment. Still, to en­han­ce cor­rect tran­sver­sal ba­lan­ce, the dag­ger­board’s can­ting func­tion becomes fun­da­men­tal in ba­lan­cing the boat ac­cor­din­gly whi­le sa­cri­fi­cing ve­ry lit­tle in terms of weight. Har­ken has been se­lec­ted to sup­ply mo­st of the deck gear. For exam­ple car­bon-top pri­ma­ry 1235 win­ches ha­ve an ex­ten­ded load ca­pa­ci­ty of 11 tons. They de­ri­ve from the 1135 grand prix win­ches wi­th a load ca­pa­ci­ty of 9 tons. Har­ken’s 990 se­ries coc­k­pit win­ches whi­ch ha­ve been pro­ven over thou­sands of mi­les in ma­ny ocean ra­ces and are cur­ren­tly ser­ving in the Vol­vo Ocean 65 fleet. Not men­tion the firm’s spe­cial ti­ta­nium shea­ves for ma­xi­mum ef­fi­cien­cy. Nor­th Sails sports a clo­se and long­stan­ding wor­king re­la­tion­ship wi­th Nau­tor’s Swan and wi­th de­si­gner Juan Kouy­ou­m­d­jian on va­rious pro­jec­ts, prior to this one. Jens Ch­ri­sten­sen Nor­th Sails Exe­cu­ti­ve Com­mit­tee Mem­ber said: “We im­me­dia­te­ly ap­pre­cia­ted Nau­tor’s Swan vi­sion for a boat that is fa­st but is al­so ea­sy to hand­le. Ha­ving par­ti­ci­pa­ted in the ear­ly sta­ges of the pro­ject ma­de it pos­si­ble for us to be ac­cu­ra­te not on­ly in sails geo­me­try de­tails but to an­ti­ci­pa­te es­sen­tial aspec­ts of per­for­man­ce that would af­fect the sails, su­ch as deck lay­out and ove­rall ba­lan­ce wi­th hy­dro­foils mat­ching the sails abo­ve the deck. Nor­th Sails and its si­ster com­pa­ny Sou­thern Spars ha­ve wor­ked to­ge­ther to pre­sent a co­he­si­ve har­mo­nious pac­ka­ge ca­pa­ble of ex­cee­ding the hi­gh ex­pec­ta­tions of the ow­ner”. Ste­ve Wil­son, de­si­gner at Sou­thern Spars ad­ded: “Our team has pu­shed the de­si­gn to its li­mit to achie­ve a ma­st that’s as light as pos­si­ble, whi­le main­tai­ning the de­gree of sa­fe­ty and re­lia­bi­li­ty

whi­ch are a mu­st in a su­pe­rya­cht of this si­ze. De­ploy­ing all of Nor­th Tech­no­lo­gy Group’s - our mo­ther com­pa­ny - ex­clu­si­ve rig and sail de­si­gn tools, we’ve been able to op­ti­mi­ze the rig in terms of weight, VCG and sail sha­pe con­trol, whi­ch de­li­ve­red wi­th fi­ne tu­ning ca­pa­bi­li­ties pu­ts a con­si­de­ra­ble de­gree of con­trol in the hands of the crew”. Tal­king of whi­ch, Fu­tu­re Fi­bres the world’s lea­ding com­po­si­te rig-

ger is not be for­got­ten ina­smu­ch as they too con­tri­bu­ted in crea­ting this uni­que pro­ject. Pre­viou­sly Fu­tu­re Fi­bres wor­ked wi­th Sou­thern Spars on Clubswan 50 al­so de­si­gned by Kouy­ou­m­d­jian. Fu­tu­re Fi­bres will be sup­ply­ing a spe­cial tor­sio­nal fo­re­stay in car­bon whi­ch de­li­vers out of the or­di­na­ry ex­tra streng­th and re­lia­bi­li­ty. Let’s not for­get Gu­rit from Swi­tzer­land. This com­pa­ny has been sup­ply­ing com­pe­ti­tion yachts for about thir­ty years, wi­th com­po­si­tes that ha­ve al­so been ex­ten­si­ve­ly te­sted in the ae­ro­spa­ce sec­tor. Con­si­de­ring what’s been said so far, we may ri­sk for­get­ting that a su­pe­rya­cht li­ke Clubswan 125 mu­st al­so be able to crui­se fa­st and sa­fe­ly al­so wi­th me­cha­ni­cal pro­pul­sion. Well de­si­gner crea­ti­vi­ty and in­ven­ti­ve has sco­red on­ce again: A die­sel en­gi­ne has been fo­re­seen for­ward of the ma­st to fur­ther dam­pen noi­se but al­so to di­stri­bu­te weights mo­re ef­fi­cien­tly whi­le a spe­cial­ly de­si­gned hy­drau­lic dri­ve unit will lo­wer the pro­pel­ler in­to the wa­ter on­ly when re­qui­red whi­ch means the­re will be no re­si­stan­ce to for­ward mo­tion whi­le using the sails alo­ne as the pro­pel­ler won’t be in the wa­ter. Fi­nal­ly we co­me to the ar­chi­tec­tu­re of the in­te­riors whi­ch are bo­th spec­ta­cu­lar and lu­xu­rious, as one would ex­pect from a su­pe­rya­cht of the kind. In this ca­se too Nau­tor’s Swan took on this other chal­len­ge and crea­ted a new tech­no­lo­gic ge­ne­ra­tion; whe­re am­ple de­ploy­ment of spe­cial ul­tra-light, weight sa­ving com­po­si­te ma­te­rials, will be used as well and at ti­mes al­so wi­th fi­ne wood ve­neers whi­ch add ele­gan­ce and crea­te a plea­sing con­tra­st that in a cer­tain sense will be­fit the ya­cht’s dual per­so­na­li­ty. And not on­ly. Still thin­king about weight and its di­stri­bu­tion, ma­ny of the ele­men­ts ma­king up the fur­ni­tu­re and the de­cor will pos­sess a struc­tu­ral func­tion as is the ca­se for the re­fi­ned so­fas in the sa­loon/li­ving room area whi­ch will su­re­ly be ve­ry com­for­ta­ble but will al­so dou­ble as use­ful struc­tu­ral stif­fe­ners. As for the lay­out, the in­te­rior de­si­gner team has fai­th­ful­ly in­ter­pre­ted the ow­ner’s re­quests in se­pa­ra­ting the crew and tech­ni­cal area from the lar­ge sa­loon and from the ow­ner’s sui­te whi­ch runs full beam across and when ne­ces­sa­ry it can be tran­sfor­med in­to two ca­bins wi­th se­pa­ra­te ba­th­rooms by in­ser­ting a bul­khead leng­th­wi­se. “We’ve ma­na­ged to draw up the in­te­riors whi­ch ful­ly com­ply to the re­qui­re­men­ts of a su­pe­rya­cht and to tho­se of a re­cord brea­king ra­cer. And being part of a team whi­ch can rea­li­se a pro­ject su­ch as this one, is an ex­pe­rien­ce whi­ch will be al­ways re­mem­be­red” said Hei­ni Gu­stafs­son, in­te­rior & sty­ling se­nior de­si­gner. Can’t tell him he’s wrong, cor­rect?